EXPLORE

SOMEWHERE IN SYDNEY

17 July 2016
Sunday, July 17, 2016

After my time on the Gold Coast I headed back down to Sydney for my flight home. I arrived at 8am on yet another overnight bus, one month after I first entered Australia. I had booked a cheap hostel on Hostel World because it claimed to have an early check-in option, from 9am.
Here, I’d just like to warn fellow backpackers not to book this particular hostel (ChiliBlue Backpackers) if you’re ever passing through Sydney, after my experience on arriving at 9am to check-in, and then having abuse shouted at me by the greasy-haired man on reception for ‘turning up too early’, and for having the audacity to politely suggest that they update their online information about check-in times.

One small silver-lining of this horrible experience, was that I got to witness some actual, real-life, karmic retribution for his behaviour, because when he opened the hostel vending machine to get some change, two full-fat cans of Coca Cola fell out and exploded on the floor. I couldn’t stop myself from bursting out laughing and saying, “have fun cleaning that up” before walking out. Served him right.

Anyway, I went next-door to The Original Backpackers where I was immediately shown to a room, after a much warmer welcome.

After a quick sleep, the nice man on reception at Originals, Bruce, gave me a map and showed me a walk I could do from the hostel to Mrs Macquarie’s Chair, to get a different view of the Sydney Opera House. So I set off for the last time, to make the most of my final day in Sydney.

The walk really did turn out to be something worth recommending as it gives you a great view of the Harbour Bridge as well as the Opera House.

You’re able to walk all the way around the bay to see the Opera House up close, which I hadn’t bothered to do last time I was in Sydney.

You can loop round back through the botanical gardens to get back to the city.

After some excellent Thai food for dinner, I went back to the hostel for an early night before my flight back to the UK the next day.

I was feeling a bit nervous at this point because my boyfriend had no idea I was flying thousands of miles round the world to surprise him, but I was mainly just excited to see my friends and family for the first time in three months of travelling.